Painting Shadows from Light
by Stephyblue
Summary: Quinn is a ghost, dead - but not gone. She's drawn herself into a world so dark she might never exist again; even if she can when light touches her. So when Rachel moves into the 'vacant' dark home and upends everything Quinn knows, whose to say that their friendship won't awaken her heart. After all, she's capable of so many things, like being alive and even falling in love. :)
1. Prologue

A/N: Pick #3. I will put "Fun with Rachel and Quinn back up when these are finished and we can take another crack at the most wanted out of the remaining and a few new prompts. Did I tell you I have 45 different ideas jotted down... we have so much to do together :) And so much writing ahead. Take care.

* * *

**Prologue**

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Reginald Thomas Hayes, Tommy for short, considered himself somewhat of a badass.

Between the fact that his father owned the successful chain of Breadstix restaurants and his older brother was the captain of the football team; he had a reputation to live up to. At the age of ten, he had already kissed a half dozen girls and broken more than twice that in hearts. He did just enough in school to get by and honestly didn't really care. He was going to be rich when he took over his father's restaurants. Math and English weren't important when you just had to wait around for the old man to kick the bucket.

However, he had to keep up appearances. He knew enough to know that he had to be the dutiful son and the decent, if not brilliantly miss-directed student. He was certainly _not_ the person that put a rat trap on Professor Burke's chair, or cut off half of Harriet 'Fish Face' Turner's hair, regardless of what she said.

And he was certainly not so chicken shit that he couldn't go into the abandoned house at the end of the street.

It had become somewhat a rite of passage for every young person growing up in Lima. At the end of Park Drive, where it saddled up to the dual cul-de-sac of Sycamore Lane was a house so shrouded in mystery that it haunted children even in their dreams. He was not one of those children, not in the slightest if you asked him. No, Tommy was a badass in every sense of the word.

So, when he looked back over his shoulder at his friends, bicycles hanging from expectant hands, he didn't swallow his fear down. He told himself he didn't have any. Light bulb in hand, he stared up at the front door again.

What he knew of the home was pieced together from his brother and his friends. He was pretty sure that they were fucking with him, but he tightened his jaw as he recounted the story. Ten years ago, a girl died here. Well, not _here_ – but lived here when she died. She was twenty-four and her name was Quinn Fabray.

Her death wasn't anything dramatic, no fiery demise, no horrific murder. She had apparently died in her sleep. The tragedy of it was cloaked in words like angelic, beautiful and promising. The word promising seemed to have floated around more than most others. Tommy didn't really care about the details of her porcelain skin or the absolute striking sea mist green that her eyes had been; no, he concerned himself with only one important and relevant fact.

People said the Quinn girl was still here.

"What's taking so long Tommy? You afraid of a girl?"

It was Dave. The rat bastard. "Shut up. I'm just trying to remember how far my brother got before he ran out."

Tommy knew, he remembered. His older brother, MVP of life Billy Hayes, got as far as the staircase before he pissed himself. He yelled about seeing something, something _awful_. As far as memories go, it was probably the starkest Tommy had had in his life up until this point. He remembered the pale drawn look in his brother's face and the betraying wet stain on the front of his pants. And he vowed that not only would he get to the staircase, he would screw in the bulb too.

And he certainly wouldn't piss himself.

He was armed with knowledge that his brother didn't have. Rumor had it, that when the ghost was close, the bulb would light. There didn't have to be electricity. She would just make it – go. His blue eyes fixed hard on the filament in his grip and its darkness gave him enough courage to clomp up the four steps and slam the door open.

Okay, not slam. He wasn't stupid. He had seen the movies, when you slammed a door open, the ghost killed you. It is better to say that Tommy opened the door _quickly_, and left it to creak eerily into the darkness. He looked back at the bright summer day and his wide eyed friends firmly planted on the sidewalk.

It was dark inside, darker and dustier than his brother had ever said. He didn't particularly care about spiders, but the webs – huge spiraling geometric forms made him shiver. They were wide enough to catch a person and that would equal huge spiders. He imagined huge hairy-legged creepers that could carry off something like his dog Max.

Which he imagined would've been cool, you know, until the part where his dog was gone.

When his eyes finally fell to his prize, he couldn't believe how perfect it was. It was just how his brother had said it would be; beyond the rise of the staircase, past the webs of giant spiders, sat the table. And on that table, was the lamp.

It wasn't an ordinary lamp, well – it was, but it held wonders and fame far beyond the perceived value of a common household lamp. It was _the_ lamp. It was _the_ lamp, on _the_ table, inside _the_ Fabray house. And if he could just get _the_ light bulb in his hand into that lamp, he would have all the fame for himself.

Indiana Jones music playing in his head, Tommy edged a careful foot inside. The floor groaned and his heart thudded until it drowned out the sound. He glanced around the door, his eyes landing on faded red overstuffed chairs that looked crappy, and a coffee table like the one he broke last summer.

He didn't know what it was he had been expecting, maybe a grizzly rotten face to be staring at him, but when the room looked normal he straightened up. He felt the thread of relief paint through him and just to show how much cooler he was than everyone else he turned back to the porch. "You buncha pussies! I'm gonna do it!"

Tommy felt doubly proud of himself for that. Not only did he scream loud enough that if the ghost _was_ here, it would have heard him; but because he said pussy. And no one should yell _that_ according to his brother.

Eyes on the bulb in his hand, Tommy made his way to the staircase. Renewed by the sound of glittering glass under his feet, triumph over countless other people who had chickened out, he stopped at the steps. Sure enough, underfoot millions of shards and silver threaded bases, populated the dusty old wood floor like a winter wonderland. "Buncha pussies."

He really liked the sound of that. And Tommy was pretty sure that if he screwed in the bulb all his teachers would respect him enough to let him say it too. Only the coolest people could get away with it after all.

High above his head, he stared at a light. It was one of those things found in all haunted houses. A knock off candle holder-thingy, the fake candle bulbs shattered. It hung from a wire, fraying at where it must have rubbed for a hundred years against the drywall hole.

Tommy did a once around the entryway. As a matter of fact, every light, every receptacle seemed to have been shattered or broken beyond use. His eyes darted quickly from the cobweb riddled chandelier above him, to the living room standing lamp, to the one at the top of the staircase. It was only _the_ lamp seeming to be the one that would allow him his victory.

For a fleeting moment, he thought it smelled an awful lot like the trap Han Solo walked into in Cloud City. However, hubris intact, he started forward. His feet hammered over the dust, flipping puffs up around him. Tommy ducked dexterously under the cobwebs and just because he could, did a somersault onto the worn Oriental rug.

If a ten year old boy could salivate over a prize at hand, then this ten year old boy would be doing just that. He could smell it, smell victory. From his position on the floor, still ducked into a quasi-jedi position, the smell of victory was oddly reminiscent of wet dog, or moldy rug. He wasn't sure which.

Tommy checked to be sure the bulb was still dark.

Standing he snickered to himself. Positioning the bulb over the receptacle, he held it up like the sword blow that would vanquish his eternal foe. "You aren't so scary now cause I have you!"

From this close, he could see his reflection in the surface of the porcelain lamp. He stared at it, glanced around to the dust flanking all the surfaces about him and shrugged. It didn't matter; nothing mattered but this glorious moment.

He fit the bulb into the lamp and with careful motions secured it in place.

Slowly, ever so painstakingly slowly, he pulled his hands back. In his mind, when he screwed the light bulb in he had imagined that it would glow. However, looking back on that thought – it would have been a very bad thing indeed. It would have meant that the ghost was close.

So, when the bulb before him warmed slightly, the filament turning from a gray wire, to an orange sherbet color, he wasn't sure if it was his imagination or not. One thing was for certain, he was never eating that ice cream again.

It didn't flare immediately, but right as he was turning, right as he planned to make his escape – several things happened at once. He saw the light turn so bright white he felt heat on the side of his face, Tommy became aware of the fact that his hair was standing on end, and he slammed face first into something that he could only describe as cotton candy.

He bobbled backward because the entryway was supposed to be there, but instead there was a clingy brush of _something_. A something that melted into smoke an instant after he touched it.

Tommy's next most formative memory was made at this moment. It was why he never dated green eyed girls.

As his head tilted back, eyes forming to saucer sized proportions, he came face-to-face with Quinn Fabray. To be accurate, he had come face-to-breast with her first, but it was the face part that registered. It lit his brain from the inside out when icy green eyes, flecked with gold bore down into his. He froze, staring up through her, but not. She was a whisper, but not. It was only her eyes that had tangible presence and the rest of her was lost against the backdrop of broken house.

Those eyes bore into his soul while strands of smoke and shadows whisked around him. She looked like a cloud, and he had the odd thought of thunderstorms and rain as he peed himself.

Those eyes held him though, even as they focused downward to where his bladder had betrayed him. Under that razor sharp inspection he realized he would rather die than have the ghost girl look at him like that.

"Get out of my house." It was a growl, dark and ominous and tossed with the echo of the universe.

It snapped him from where he was rooted to the carpet and Tommy screamed. He screamed louder when the overcharged light bulb hummed behind him, covering the back of his neck in Hell's fury. She moved in a flicker, a whip of dust and dots as she curled out of sight.

"Out of my house, you little jerk!"

He couldn't see the ghost anymore, but he knew she was there – somewhere. Her voice came from everywhere at once, thundering and dark with anger.

So he ran; ran as hard and as fast as his legs could carry him. He covered himself in cobwebs and dust as he screamed bloody murder for someone – _anyone_ to save him. Tommy didn't dare look back, didn't dare break stride as he raced past the staircase and threw himself out the front door.

He ran past his friends, not stopping to regale them with his heroics before the ghost appeared. No, Tommy ran like the devil was chasing him, because she _was_. Straight home, down the street, until he could no longer hear the screams of his friends, he ran.

"What the hell happened to him?"

Dave laughed, "He pissed himself. Didja see that? What a little bitch."

A few others watched as Tommy cut over a yard and turned the corner down the block. One of them glanced back at the house and slapped the closest kid to him on the arm.

"Quit it!"

"No, look."

And inside they could see the light, glowing like a signal fire from beyond the grave. It was Dave, in his elegant twelve year old way that explained everyone's thoughts. "Oh fucking shit!"

What was rumored to have happened after was that Tommy's friends, breathlessly captivated by the beacon, watched as the door closed. They watched wide-eyed and open mouthed in horror as the large oak door, with its big brass knocker, closed soundlessly.

It wasn't until the bolt slipped tight with a clunk that they finally scattered.


	2. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1**

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To say Rachel Berry was a fighter was putting it mildly. The girl had spunk; no one could deny her of that label. However, life had been a bit of a problem for her lately and that was putting it mildly too.

It was a somber drive Rachel made from her New York apartment, to her hometown in Lima, Ohio. It was made better by the constant litany of blissful notes rattling through her speaker system, but only just. Jazz music's glorious brass and the cooling tones of blues guitar interwove her wave across the whole of the United States and carried her to the law office of one Cecil R. Brown.

Attorney at law.

Cecil R. Brown, Attorney at Law, said his title at every chance as if he was still surprised he had obtained the degree in the first place. Rachel herself had a lot to brag about and his brazen reaching for accolades left her with an air of distaste. She rolled his most recent message around in her mind, even as she licked her teeth erasing the invisible taste of his words from her mouth.

A diner on the outskirts of town fogged into view and Rachel turned up her car's defroster, because buildings shouldn't _fog_ into view even in the early morning.

It was common knowledge, at least to Rachel, that her parents had died. She had been at the funeral, so she had a very intimate understanding that they had an untimely passing. So when Cecil had stated apologies in his message with spectacular levels of brevity, wrought with understanding and condolences, Rachel had been rather put off.

Okay, the term 'put off' was a bit of an understatement honestly.

She had been downright angry about it and to thoroughly discharge that irritation she had found a stage at school and played her heart out to any song she could think of on the biggest grand piano she could find. Rachel didn't care that people were in the middle of studying at that moment in the auditorium. They probably needed an uplifting set of songs just as much as she did.

One can only stand so much chemistry, math and literature before the brain needed a break.

However, the point wasn't to get into that – the point was that Cecil R. Brown, Attorney at Law, was a bit of a pompous, socially stunted jackass.

He proved it again when Rachel stared at him icily over his desk, exhausted from her three day drive, while he talked on the phone to what one would assume was his girlfriend. Though who would date a man like him, Rachel couldn't even fathom in the moment.

Rachel was not normally an icy person. In actuality, she was a warm if not occasionally fiery person. Her mahogany eyes matched her countenance; ever shifting between subdued and flickering with fervor. That fire inside her had been honed through countless years of torment for her musical talent, social awkwardness and compact frame. At a little under five feet and two inches tall, she had gotten used to the idea that bigger people were going to steamroll over her, so she needed to be nimble and fast to survive.

The death of her family had taken some of that dexterity away though. She found herself floundering, stock still in the face of life. A life she could no longer dodge or move out of the way of. So Cecil's blatant disregard during such a difficult time, wore her down and crushed life into her brittle heart.

In Rachel's mind, his behavior was the additional verification that his insincere condolences were just that; and hollow comfort was worse than no comfort at all.

"All right lovie dear, I'll talk to you soon."

Even as a romantic, it made her stomach churn and the overly enunciated wet kiss that ended the call propelled her nausea onward and upward until she was fairly certain she would vomit any moment.

The phone racked with a bang.

"Sorry about that."

"Oh," Rachel shook her head, noting the fifteen minute interval between the start and end of the call, "it's okay, I didn't mind." Like hell she didn't mind, but patience was a virtue she was learning to exercise lest she lose her mind.

"Now, where were we?" He touched his head, digging deep for whatever thought had catapulted out of his slippery brain. "Ah, your parents'' estate, that's right. Again, my name is Cecil R Brown, Attorney at Law-"

With a roll of her eyes, she ignored any further words while he rifled through papers on his desk. It wasn't until minutes later, Cecil R Brown, Attorney at Irritating, pulled with almost intolerable effort the manila folder on the bottom of the stack. It was where all her hopes and the last of her dreams laid. Rachel's eyes hung on it, like a strung fish on a fisherman's line.

Cecil's thick finger bludgeoned a piece of food, sling-shotting it across the office from the face of the folder. It broke her trance on the innocuous package and she watched the foodstuff rebound off the armrest of her chair and come to a rest on the floor. It was life's little dose of reality and Rachel didn't miss it. Just because something mattered to her, didn't mean it mattered to anyone else.

"Sorry."

She didn't even know how to respond so rather than dishonor her parents' memories with the curse words that painted in her mind; she folded her hands in her lap mutely.

The attorney flipped open the folder, scouring the paperwork with gusto. "So, I'm seeing that they left you as sole beneficiary."

"Yes."

"No siblings?"

"No."

"I'm terribly sorry for your loss."

Rachel firmed her lips into a line to stop the words on the tip of her tongue. "Thank you for your condolences."

He didn't miss a beat, because he didn't see the difficulty in her words. "Your parents' had a life insurance policy each in the grand total of two hundred thousand dollars and a property they have willed to you."

"The house I grew up in? Oh thank God." Rachel smiled for the first time in months. If she was coming home, then at least she could stay in the home that held so many memories. She hadn't been home in a while and it would be magnificent to be able to say it was hers. To keep the roses and the lavenders the way her mother always had. That and truly she didn't know what she would have done. She had nowhere else to live.

His eyes went to the paperwork, "no, I don't think so."

Cecil flipped pages, while Rachel's jaw came unhinged and hung lamely from her face. "It's a different one, next neighborhood over. 24192 Sycamore Lane?"

For having the ears of a musical prodigy and a penchant for listening, Rachel didn't hear the words that came out of his mouth. She _couldn't_ have.

"Wait." She held up her hand instantly transported back to grade school with the motion. "Are you telling me right now that the house I grew up in, the house I lived in my whole life, isn't my house? That there is another house in town that belongs to me now?"

Cecil R. Brown, Attorney at Sucking, lifted his eyes from the data and fixed Rachel with what could best be described as concern. He looked at her like she was about to explode and he didn't know how close that was to the truth. Beneath his desk, her hands rattled on the armrests of her chair as she squeezed them.

"Well, the bank technically owns your parents' house because it wasn't paid in full at the time of their demise. The other property a cute little fixer-upper has no outstanding lien, so at this time it is all the probate can release to you."

Rachel leaned forward, mostly because all the strength in her body had been sucked out of her, but also because she wanted to double check that she heard everything correctly. "Tell me again, just so I'm sure I heard you right." Those endlessly fire-filled eyes flashed, "are you telling me that _my_ house on Pine Grove, the house I grew up in, that my mother and father _raised_ me in, is _not_ my house at this time?"

"That is correct." Cecil noted and then to stave off the fury he could see work its way onto her face, continued quickly. "However, everything within the house is yours, in storage I believe, and you can still work something out with the bank. You have good credit, right? I'm sure you can get the first crack at it before it goes to auction."

"Goes to auction?"

Rachel sounded as insane as she felt. This couldn't be real life, because even real life had a stopping point before it tipped into this realm of crazy. Certainly, she had failed to wake up this morning and was currently asleep in the Motel 6 she had stopped in last night. Between the argument from the room to her left and the raucous sex in the room above, it would make sense that she is still asleep - dreaming of nightmarish probates that were royally fucking her.

"Would you like a glass of water?"

It jarred her and Rachel took a breath, levying her gaze on the particularly dumbfounded and inept man across from her. "A glass of water? No, I wouldn't like a glass of water, thank you very much!"

"No? No- okay I understand."

And that was it; the straw that broke the proverbial camel's back, or in this case, the shoulders of one twenty-two year-old girl. "No, you don't understand! All people say is, I understand, but they don't!" She hadn't meant to yell and propriety once again intact she took a breath and pointed to the papers before Cecil R Brown, Attorney at Misery. "You have no idea what it feels like to go through this - you have no idea. Don't you dare belittle my pain and my loss by saying that you understand."

"I'm sorry." He stared down at the top of her head as she melted against his desk, covering her face.

"And don't you say you're sorry." She sniffed, loudly. It was something she typically didn't do except when she was alone and didn't have tissue on hand. However, appearances be damned she was going to sniff because she certainly didn't want a tissue from _him_.

It seemed like the clock ticked endlessly as Rachel Berry, ousted from her family home, gathered whatever tatters of her will she had left. It wasn't much, but she put a few pieces back, enough to sit up from her position at the edge of the desk. "Do you have the keys?"

"Just one."

She didn't say anything to that, she just held out her hand. When he handed it over to her, it looked and felt just like any other key. It certainly didn't feel like it was _hers_, though it was. Rachel didn't know what to think about that as she pocketed it deftly. "Thank you for your time. I assume the checks will be sent to me at-"

"24192 Sycamore, yes."

"Great." Rachel sighed as she stood.

"It is. It will be, I'm sure of it."

She bit her tongue until she couldn't, "that was sarcasm."

"Oh," he smiled at her, "missed that."

Rachel walked to the door, looking back for a moment. "Can I give you some advice?"

The attorney nodded, "shoot."

"Don't say your title every time you say your name, its grating and annoying."

He looked at her blankly for a moment before his face exploded into a smile. "Ah, I got you, sarcasm, right?"

Rachel narrowed her eyes, "right, exactly."

And she left him with a look hanging on his fat features that signified he was starting to understand her tonality.

So, truth be told, she felt shame for being mean to the Attorney at Stupidity; damn it, she couldn't stop saying it or twisting it. Rachel felt shame for being mean to _him_ because she wasn't normally a spiteful person. She was a self-professed lover of all things. From aardvark to zymurgy, she could make room in her heart for just about anything. She believed that fervently, until she saw the house. When she saw 24192 Sycamore, she was consumed with other feelings beside pride over knowing the first and last words in the English dictionary.

Namely, shock.

Shock is a good way to put it, because though she wasn't paralyzed with horror over the state of the property, her budding ideas about selling it straight away, slid right into the gutter. Which made sense, because even those were defunct. Cecil R Brown's idea of a 'fixer-upper' in this case actually meant take-a-wrecking-ball-and-destroy-it-is how-you-fix-it upper.

As she stood outside the house, she had a hell of a time even _imagining _calling it hers. However, never one to back down from a challenge, she had to at the very least see it before she weighed in on how miserable she was going to be. There wasn't much hope in happy, just scaling levels of misery that would be determined by the state of affairs inside.

Rachel scowled at the boarded up broken windows and mammoth oak tree in the front yard while she headed up to the sagging porch. "Okay, let's see what we have here then." She cheered herself on softly.

The knocker in her face weathered and dyed green from the elements taunted her with its fleur-de-lis. A green fleur-de-lis was symbolic of hope after all.

The key turned in her hand.

Rachel pressed the door open and shivered, fanning away dust she has swept up in the arc of the door. "You have got to be kidding me." I was a resigned comment; one that Rachel knew meant that she was in over her head and was not kidding herself about that fact.

As she surveyed the dank enclosure, she could smell water damage in the form of mildew and it clung to the back of her throat tasting similarly to how murky aquariums smell. Dust and mold, mold and dust piled on top of one another. There were bugs, and mice and dirt and out of style furniture.

She stared down at the wood floor, eyes following footsteps in the layers of filth. And child sized thieves to add to the fray.

It was almost more than she could bare and Rachel Berry could bare a lot. Straight shoulders crumbled artfully, because everything Rachel did was artful. She crumbled against the door and let a moments worth of human emotion drag a sharp sob from the back of her throat. The sound was loud in the entryway and surprised her.

Tears in her eyes, she straightened up under the harsh reality that she had nothing and no one. And this house, this comically destroyed and waterlogged frame was not going to be the undoing of her. She was Rachel Berry, after all. She had to at least make a decent attempt to find a silver lining in this situation.

And find a silver lining she would, but first; Rachel needed to open a damn window. Determination in her delicate steps, she strode past the stairs, past a table with a lamp and threw the curtains aside.

In the milliseconds between her wrist whipping out the motion, and the curtains following her command, Rachel realized one important thing. It was a big mistake to throw open curtains that had sat idle since the dawn of time. Rachel wheezed out a choke as all manner of dust and particulates, dead things and – ew – bits of dead things, swirled into the air around her.

She covered her nose and mouth, backing away. "Gross."

She took a breath and then used both hands to pry down the weakest looking board. It came free with a pop and she let it fall to the floor. She started on the next, working it side to side and up and down until it came loose. It was enough to get the window open, and thank God too because she was almost going to have to breathe again.

Rachel was able to get one solid breath of fresh air before the cross draft made the situation that much worse. The breeze raked in and through, starting from the doorway in the foyer and ending at the window to Rachel's back, dragging dust and webs, bugs and mildew along for its journey. It covered her from head to foot in a refuse baptism, a welcome home gift if ever she had received one.

Rachel reflected that it wasn't the best gift she had ever gotten, but as she pursed her lips and blinked, it wasn't the worst either. Reaching up to pull free a long sticky strand of web that covered her face, she laughed. It was either that, or cry and she was all out of tears on this situation.

She was halfway through dusting herself off when a voice came from the porch. "Hello?" It caught her mid-motion and she froze, staring at the woman on the porch.

In that moment, both women had the exact same thought. The woman standing across from her was the ghost.

Rachel was the first to move and did what any intelligent person would do when confronted with an apparition; she grabbed the lamp before her, holding it up to defend herself. Because as everyone knows lamps are perfect defense for spiritual energy. The reciprocal motion from the front porch was for Sally Hanson to point the umbrella in her hand at the gray figure before her; yet another stellar response against the supernatural.

Brandishing their weapons like Spartan warriors, they stared at one another. Neither moved, breathed. Rachel opened her mouth after a moment, when she was sure she could find her voice and her arms started to shake from the weight of the lamp. "I'm sorry I'm in your house."

Sally furrowed her brow, "this isn't my house. Is it yours?"

Rachel licked her lips, glancing over to where the lamp shook in her grip. She imagined how ridiculous she looked and slowly she righted it back on the table. "Yes, it is."

Dubious eyes regarded her. "Are you the ghost?"

The futility of that question was astounding, because any ghost worth their salt would say Rachel's exact response. "No, I thought you were."

"No, I'm not."

"Okay good."

"So who are you then?" It was Sally who asked it.

"I'm Rachel, the new owner I guess."

"I'm Sally Hanson, no relation to the beauty line." She says it like Rachel would have thought they were related, or one in the same, when it was actually the furthest thing from her mind. What Rachel currently wondered was when she gave the woman permission to come in? Now that no threat was apparent, Sally was finger deep in a dusty bowl in the foyer and glancing around appraisingly.

To be fair, because if there was anything Rachel was, it was fair – Sally Hanson looked like a chicken. Perhaps it was a little caddy of her to make that association, but Sally had a frock at her neck and the way it moved when she spoke and not-so-subtly looked around made her look like a chicken; albeit a well-dressed finely polished chicken, but a chicken nonetheless.

"As the newest member of the town board, it's my job to greet all newcomers. And let me tell you a newcomer to the Fabray House is like Christmas; one that only comes every fifteen years." She laughed then, deep and throaty like it was the best joke in the world. Rachel could only imagine the perverse twist to create such a laugh. "And Rachel dear, tell me what do you want to do with this place? Tear it down or fix it up?"

Rachel regarded the woman before her, a little taken aback. She had no interest in going into the fact she wasn't a newcomer. The more pressing question that burned in her stomach was what _was_ she going to do with this place? Right now it seemed to be the only connection to her fathers that she had. "I'm not sure yet."

"Well, please do tell me when you figure it out." Sally laughed uneasily. "I can't tell you how long this place has just made the children crazy and driven down property values. It would be absolutely marvelous to have _something_ done with it. An eyesore like this just can only be tolerated so long."

There certainly was _something_ to be said about Sally's tone. All the veiled innuendo in the world couldn't hide the fact she hated the Fabray House. Rachel didn't even need to know the history of the house to know that fact. And even though she didn't particularly like the house, it was enough tone to make Rachel defensive. After all, the Fabray House was hers now and no one but _she_ had the right to talk trash on the sorry estate of _her_ home.

"Well, Sally," Rachel smiled easily, crossing her arms as she leaned casually on the hallway arch, "I appreciate you coming by. I have to get back to it now, so thank you again."

And Sally knew by _that_ tone that she was being thrown out. "Oh. Well. I certainly didn't mean to intrude on your - renovation." Rachel watched as the woman, who was as much chicken stuffing as she was subtle, reddened under her gaze. It was oddly satisfying to watch her gather herself and step out onto the porch.

It was almost as rewarding to wait as Sally shut the door behind her with an unrepentant backward wave. Rachel stared at the door, pursing her lips in thought. Her eyes traced the arch in the dust at the base of it, where beneath the time gathered particles a swatch of etched wood showed through. It looked engraved, beautiful, timelessly elegant.

It lightened Rachel's spirit to see it if for no other reason than she had a starting point, something beautiful to hang onto; a silver lining. And beside her white crown molding announced itself against the cream wall. A smile broke out on her face. She trailed her hand through the yellowing dust, marveling at the cream and white and polished dark wood mixing together.

Rachel took a step back, glancing up at the chandelier. She imagined how it would look lit, light glittering across the floor. Her heart started to pound. There was potential! When her gaze went to the second floor landing, she raced upstairs. Feet hitting hardwood steps that rebounded around her, Rachel raced into the first room she saw, a bedroom.

The next, a bathroom with a claw foot tub.

And further, another bedroom and a study complete with sitting chairs and an old desk.

It was the room at the end of the hall that sucked all the air out of her lungs though. As soon as she pushed it open, her eyes widened, mouth hanging open. It was shaped like a castle's corner tower, circular, highly arched ceiling that opened to a skylight. The trickle of sunlight through the grime filtered swatches of light across the floor.

Rachel followed it, followed the paths of light until her eyes paused on an easel. It wasn't so much the easel that stole Rachel's attention like a thief; it was the half-finished painting on it that pooled all the blood in her body to her feet. Rachel traced careful steps toward the painting, toward the face that glittered from it, lacquered in oils that wove into one another so realistically she swore the painting was looking at her.

It was at _that_ moment, that Rachel Berry came face-to-face with Quinn Fabray.

Half cast in shadows, a teasingly soft smile hung on indulgent bowing lips. Her eyes, misty and green, laced in bronze and copper starbursts, begged for Rachel to stare into them; dared her to get lost in them. Framed in long silken blonde hair that flowed and tumbled and disappeared into pencil sketching, was the most strikingly refined face she had ever seen. It literally took her breath away.

Rachel was so focused on the image it took her a full minute to turn and recognize the veritable sea of artwork that littered the ground beside her. When she focused on what she was looking at, the painting in her grip slackened until it was hanging limply in her hand.

Landscapes, houses, trees, seasons, faces, children – hundreds of canvases painted to the finest detail, painstakingly crafted in oil and watercolor laid strewn across the floor like wreckage on a frozen sea.

She knelt down, because the images made her knees weak. She studied the first one and then the next. All of them signed E.A, in a soft flowing signature that looked more like a Grecian symbol than initials. However, Rachel just _knew_ it was the Quinn girl's artwork, she knew in her bones this had been her studio, even before she had seen the signature.

Rachel looked back at the painting in her hand.

As an artist in her own rite, Rachel could appreciate genius in its many forms. She could appreciate the skill it took to create something from nothing. It was what she did with every song she composed. So this moment of realization tugged at her almost painfully because what a waste it had been. All that talent was just - gone. It was enough to make her thespian heart break.

Rachel didn't fully comprehend how even as the image sat in her hands, it cored at her heart. "You were an amazing artist. What a shame." It curved on her lips with wanton disregard, fingers tracing lightly over the portrait's soulful gaze.

And after a beat, Rachel didn't hear the softly whispered, "That's life."


	3. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

* * *

To say Quinn was _just_ a ghost, was like saying the ocean was _just_ water.

Sure, she was a spirit just like the sea was just, well the sea - but she was so much more than that. Quinn was special. She _had_ been special while she was alive and in Quinn's mind that transferred through death.

She _thought_ it transferred anyway, until she realized being special meant nothing when people couldn't see you.

Because let's be honest, when people couldn't bask in her glory, it was pretty hollow and worthless. Beauty, talent, promise – all those things that rebounded through Quinn's head about herself, were just a reflection. It was a reflection of how people saw her and since they couldn't anymore, those things were as invisible as her own image.

She might as well have been that irritating riddle that asked if a tree fell in a forest and no one was around, would it make a sound. Quinn could now say definitively that the answer was a resounding no, and by resounding - she meant echoing with utter silence.

And then Rachel Berry came into her life.

Rachel came into Quinn's life as an irritant that baffled her, confused her and annoyed her to no end. No, that is being too nice; Rachel was a pain in the ass. A _smart_ pain in the ass which was worse than any other pain she could be. A _pretty_ pain in the ass; it was even worse Quinn thought _that_.

It started just after she put her grubby hands all over Quinn's self-portrait.

Okay, so her hands weren't actually grubby, maybe a little dusty from pawing through things, but not grubby. However the way she had held the portrait, the only thing Quinn had to remember how striking she had looked, bothered her. It bothered her because it had been a long time since anyone had _seen_ her. Sure, children and families had been scared shitless at the sight of her, but they hadn't _actually_ seen her, into her, into who she used to be. The exposure of it made Quinn angry, angry enough to talk to herself; which was breaking her cardinal rule of sanity checking.

So, even though she knew no one could hear, she talked to herself in the house while Rachel started cleaning. She prattled on absently, cursing her existence and the smiling brunette who hummed as she worked. Quinn criticized everything from the way Rachel swept to the dumb way she cuffed her pants when she mopped.

She had started in Quinn's bedroom, gently stacking her paintings. Moving her easel from the perfect place where the light hit everything just right. She marked her existence on Quinn's in-existence and utterly screwed up what took Quinn years to discover.

Quinn considered herself a relatively patient person, so she tried to keep her cool.

However, When Rachel started to toss furniture out; was when Quinn started screaming at her. It wasn't Quinn's stuff so she didn't _actually_ care, everything had been left by the previous owners, but she yelled at the brunette anyway. She screamed until she imagined her throat was raw from her bitterness, because how dare _anyone_ come into her home and change it? Rachel didn't have consent, she didn't have a right. And she didn't even seem to care about what she was doing. I mean, what if this faded furniture _had_ been hers. What then? It incensed her until she couldn't stand it anymore and left.

That is something important to note.

The ground rules.

First, Quinn wasn't bound to her house. She had seen the crappy movies when she had lived, the ones that said ghosts were stuck to forever haunt their residence. They weren't true. Quinn had wrongly believed that for years as she looped the place she once called home. It wasn't until she couldn't stand one more glance of dirtying wood floor or rotting baseboards that she threw herself outside in an attempted ghostly suicide.

An unsuccessful one, where she hovered on the porch for a minute and realized she _could_ leave.

It had been very anti-climactic.

Another thing Quinn learned was that she was made of energy. Spiritual energy, yes – but electrical too. She figured it had something to do with resonance, though she hadn't been able to pick up a book in years to confirm it.

She knew how it worked, but not how to label it. If she got close to something that ran off electricity, it would charge. Lights, heaters, microwaves, cellular phones and even toys; they lit up like Christmas lights around her. Most of it had no effect on her, aside from irritation when it passed within a few feet of her.

However light was a different story.

By different story, Quinn meant embarrassing story. She had always been able to see herself and she could change the way she presented herself. She could switch clothing, hairstyles, makeup. She could even be naked, which was what she had been the moment that someone turned on a flashlight and pinned her with it.

To be fair, she thought she was invisible in her home and hadn't been expecting a burglar, because no one had seen her, not in years. So when she leaned on the wall in nothing but her birthday suit and smiled her shit eating grin, she was pretty sure the teenage guy couldn't see her. Until the light persisted and his mouth fell open. Slowly Quinn realized that maybe, just _maybe_ – the look of surprise in his face was more for the fact he _could_ see her and less of the fact that he _couldn't_.

And then when realization washed over her, she screamed.

Screamed and tripped because she couldn't float, until the flashlight finally went to the ceiling dropped from a startled hand and she could disappear again. That was how she learned the second ground rule; light made her solid, as solid and real as any twenty year-old girl.

And apparently, not only solid but visible in _all_ her glory.

That was the last time she ever jaunted around naked in her house, just in case.

That little light trick had benefited her much more than it had humiliated her. Though, in retrospect she was still kinda mortified over the whole thing. What? Even though she was dead, she still had feelings. It was embarrassing to pose like that for a random person!

Digression aside, the light trick had helped her defend her territory. It kept her home safe, comfortable and hers. Though, it came with its downside because the neighborhood brats decided to use it as a trial of manly strength; which meant every year she had to contend with at least one stupid brazen kid stumbling into her house to prove their worth. And of course, Quinn had answered that call. Who wouldn't relish the opportunity to take someone down a peg?

They were fond memories, wonderful memories of having power that Rachel had stolen for her smart-ass self.

Quinn realized Rachel knew that light made her solid when on the third day of moving stuff in and out there were no lamps in the mix. The flimsy hope she had clung to of keeping the brunette at bay had been foiled. It infuriated Quinn to spectacular levels of annoyance. So day by day, Rachel worked in the house until sunset, and drove Quinn absolutely mad with fury that she couldn't _do_ anything to stop the deconstruction of her world.

And it went on, weeks dragged by where the brunette would arrive at daybreak and upheave everything Quinn knew a piece at a time. She promised herself vengeance, swore through heaving breaths that as soon as a lamp appeared in the house she would kill that little brown headed bitch. It wasn't something she would have done if she was alive, but as a dead person it didn't much matter.

Nothing really much mattered apparently.

However, three weeks into the hellish torture, Rachel started talking and then _peace and fucking quiet_ mattered. It mattered a whole hell of a lot. The pianist babbled about her family, talked about her school in California and cried. She did a lot of crying. It was irritating because she wasn't a pretty crier.

Rachel asked Quinn probing questions the ghost couldn't answer. She couldn't become corporeal, speak or manipulate a shotgun to end her own misery. She could only do it in light, so when Rachel would ask a question and wait, it both annoyed and upset her. Quinn didn't understand why it bothered her, why it made her chest tighten and eyes burn.

Why did it bother her?

That particular question began to take on even more mass than she had, until it was the size of the god damned glisteningly clean foyer. Hovering in the middle of the darkening room, staring through the window as Rachel disappeared down the walk every night; Quinn began to miss the irritating girl's chatter.

And the nights became that much longer.

That was when Quinn started doing things she hadn't done in a long time. She went to see the only friend she had. They weren't actually friends, not really. Sam Pierce had been her father's friend, oddly enough. For being a genuinely nice warm person, Sam didn't seem to be the type to align with Quinn's cold and aloof father. But he had been.

He owned the hardware store on Main Street, and Quinn found herself there, sitting on a stool in the back. From behind the thick workshop window she could stare out at the store and watch people get last minute purchases up front. Even though the desk light beside her was lit, and the ceiling light on the other side of the glass was humming, she knew no one could see her.

So she sat and watched as Sam and other people lived life around her. Semi-corporeal and miserable she watched as the older man closed up for the night and waited as he turned out the lights. He was about to walk out, oblivious man he was, until the one light still lit in the back caught his attention.

Quinn raised an eyebrow at his puzzled expression, because she wondered how long it would take for him to figure it out. It had been five years after all, since she had come around. When his eyes fell to the double plated glass she sat behind, she knew he knew she was there.

There was an inexplicable look that came over his face, one that resonated with warmth. It was a warmth that should have heated through her, but instead plied against her and shattered any remaining strength she had. Thank you Rachel Berry for that too.

As he neared the back office Quinn stood and shifted behind the door, blocking it with her body.

"Quinn?"

She didn't answer, couldn't answer. She hung her head as the doorknob rattled and then fell still. "It's good to see you're here still. I tried to talk to your daddy some years back, let him know I thought you were still hanging around."

She thumped her head back against the door, it hurt. She thought it hurt and it made her head pound. It was futile, she knew it and so she didn't probe further. The only thing her father was surer of then his own glory, was that good people went to heaven. By extension if she was a ghost, then obviously she had been rejected.

What she didn't admit is that she thought that might be true too.

"I heard some young girl bought your house, some Rachel girl. You haven't run her off yet, that's good. You shouldn't be alone so much."

"Quinn?"

Sam tried the knob again and when the door swung open and the lights around him plunged the warehouse into darkness, he knew she was gone.

* * *

Sam's words haunted Quinn as much as she haunted Rachel. Maybe his words haunted her more, because while Quinn couldn't do anything to Rachel, Sam's words tortured her.

She watched Rachel paint the fleur-de-lis in the middle of the foyer as the thoughts ran through her mind. It was uncomfortable to admit, for Quinn admittance was generally uncomfortable; it was _extra_ uncomfortable for her to admit that she wasn't angry anymore.

She was scared.

Fear was something Quinn wasn't used to. She wasn't used to bone crushing uncertainty that came with fear. She was scared to death, pun intended, that when Rachel moved a light in finally, Quinn would scare her off. She imagined the brunette would see a whisper of her and leave her alone, again.

Quinn had never had anyone who talked to her, as one sided as the conversation was at this time. It was both daunting and warming to hear. She leaned on her arm and hovered just above the last step as slightly clumsy fingers traced the design with a paintbrush before her. She smiled sadly, wishing she could help.

"Quinn, I've got to confess I think you would do this better." Rachel leaned back from her place and stared at the pattern on the floor. Quinn stared at it too, tracing it with her eyes.

"I think you did fine." She knew Rachel couldn't hear her, but she had started answering more and more. Secretly, it was kinda fun when the brunette would answer like she heard her. Which is exactly what she did a moment later.

"Yeah, this is a job for you, no matter what you may think." Quinn sighed lightly as the brunette glanced at the window. It was obvious she was looking at how much light was left because her face fell at the orange swatches in the western part of the house. "Well, looks like it's time for me to take my leave."

Her eyes hung on the center of the room, moving slowly as she circled the foyer. "It's starting to look like a house now." She leaned back until she was laying on the polished floor by the door. Quinn stared at the figure eight her body made on the floor and the spill of her dark hair on the equally dark wood. "I'm really proud of it. It's a beautiful house."

"It is."

"I can't believe Sally Hanson was insinuating that I tear it down."

"Sally Hanson is a bitch."

"She is such a bi- not nice person."

Quinn laughed from her place. Rachel had yet to swear once and censored herself at every opportunity. Quinn assumed for her benefit because obviously Rachel knew the word bitch; if she had been alone she would have said it. That one little thing was certainly promising. It meant Rachel was comfortably aware of her.

Rachel sat up quickly, flinging her hair cutely. Everything Rachel did was cute. "Okay, I'm going to get out of here. I'll _see_ you tomorrow."

She laughed softly and with a backward glance she grinned cheekily. "Bad pun, I know. Good night, Quinn."

But - Rachel didn't show up the following morning.

Quinn waited at the stairs all day. She hated herself for it, for hovering at the bottom step like a puppy dog. Quinn Fabray had never been the puppy dog type. However, she apparently was today and hated herself for it. Not that she didn't mind waiting, she had spent almost a lifetime waiting. She hated that she was powerless to do anything, but wait. Oh, and worry.

She waited for Rachel silently and watched the time pass as sunlight moved across the shining floor and the fleur-de-lis. She had watched it dry, watched the stain set through the night and the moonlight.

When the sun dipped below the horizon, Quinn gave up hope that Rachel would be coming that day. Irritatingly dejected over that fact, she had just slipped through the wall of her studio when the front door opened. It caught Quinn by surprise when she peered into the entryway and saw Rachel in the darkness, back to the door. Even though she knew it was dark she looked at the skylight in the studio to confirm the palate of twilight on the sky.

"You're here aren't you? I think I can feel that you're here."

Quinn swallowed, regarding the always adorably melodramatic young woman. She drew closer, floating from the upstairs landing to the living room directly below. Rachel took a very large breath, which typically meant that she was going to sing, but instead she pulled a light bulb out of her pocket.

If Quinn had had form in that moment, her eyes would have bulged out of her head. She stared at the filament in the dying light, stared at it from across the room like it was the sun in the center of her universe. In a way, it might as well have been.

"I don't think you want to hurt me. I trust that you won't. I think we have an understanding that I just want to be happy here." She held the light out at arm's length, "I trust that you do too. I just feel really badly because this is your house and I'm here taking over without your input, without your permission. I know what it's like to lose your home."

In that moment Quinn had a thought that would forever change the relationship between them. She realized she wanted them both to be happy here too. She didn't mind that her world had been changed because it seemed to be for the better. Quinn wanted to articulate that, anything to Rachel in that moment. She neared slowly, watching as the bulb glowed amber.

"Oh God, you _are_ here."

The way she said it, the fear that ricocheted across Rachel's face, stopped Quinn cold in her steps. She was close enough now that she could feel a surge; it was like a snap inside her. It meant she could speak. Her voice always came before her form did. The brighter the light, the more solid she became. However, a flicker was enough to speak.

It was quite ironic that given the light in Rachel's hand she couldn't find her voice. It seemed to be stuck in that in-between place that lied right above her clavicle and just under her vocal chords.

"Quinn, where are you?"

Quinn rooted herself in place as Rachel moved the light and when it dimmed, moved it back until she was facing the blonde. There was no denying Rachel was a smart woman. The light bulb rattled in her grip.

"Please don't hurt me."

Quinn felt a prick in her chest that reminded her of when her parents sold the house. It made perfect sense that Rachel would say that. Absolutely perfect sense, but it didn't make it any easier to hear. She wasn't ready. It didn't matter how much Quinn wanted to say something, to be seen, to have someone to reflect off of. Rachel wasn't ready and there was too much at stake. It made her sigh heavily.

When Rachel went pale, Quinn realized she had heard her. She had heard Quinn sigh in sadness and she had gone as white as a sheet.

Quinn backed away swiftly and the light went out, leaving Rachel in the dark.

"Wait, don't go!"

"Quinn?"

"Hello!"

Ironically, this was the first altruistic thing Quinn ever did in her life. It would make sense that the person she should have been her whole life, she finally became in death. Though, that is kinda the way life is, you know?

* * *

So when Quinn floated into her studio the following evening after being gone for most of the day, she was shocked – painfully shocked when she saw the four floor lamps guarding her easel. And the easel was back where it had sat before Rachel moved it, with her portrait resting on it.

In that moment, she completely forgot herself. The arrogant and abrasive girl she once was the last time she touched her easel, was dead. The woman that remained, ran to it. She ran in disbelief and as soon as she got near the lights they fired up in an explosion of light, solidifying her, filling her body out. She felt her feet, felt her clothing hanging off her body. Quinn even felt the tickle of her hair as it tumbled around her shoulders.

She was alive, as alive as she could be. She could feel herself shaking and for the first time in years she reached out and touched something. She grabbed the easel before her and pressed her face against her portrait and just breathed. She could smell the time and age that had happened to the canvas. She could feel the burr of paint against her forehead.

It took her an eternity to lift her head and the tears on her cheeks littered the canvas. She wiped them away as her eyes drifted to the note on the furthest lamp. She plucked it from where it was scotch taped to the light.

It said three magical words, words that meant more to Quinn than anything in the world.

_I'm not afraid._

And then further down.

_Finish your beautiful picture._

_Rachel_


	4. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

* * *

Rachel penned her name to the check. She wrote with the heaviest hand she had ever had. Even though her signature was normally light, looping and playful, now it was sharp and deliberate. She had to be deliberate to strike letters across the paper that held the value of her family. She was so steeled in her motions, her name was now probably etched into the counter beneath the paper. And beneath her signature, three words followed with the force of a knife edge into her chest.

For Deposit Only.

It made her sick thinking about how every loving memory she had and the many she never would, was being signed over. It made her have to run to the bathroom after the polite bank teller took the check and added the total to her bank account. Hand clutched around the statement print out, she pushed her way into the ladies room.

Normally she didn't like going into them. Public restrooms were so, _not_ private. However, in an emergency she could set dignity aside and do what had to be done. So in the stall, between the industrial metal and the plastic of the toilet paper dispenser, Rachel contemplated the balance of her account neck deep in the white bowl.

She hated throwing up. She hated the way it felt and how it never made her feel any better. However, semi-private vomiting was better than public vomiting which was her only other options.

Shame always made everything worse especially the possibility of doing a Technicolor yawn in front of other people. Even though she had averted _that _humiliation, shame still seemed to be at the top of her list of things she was presently upchucking over. She felt infinitely bad for taking the money. Rachel knew that her parents would have wanted her to have it or they wouldn't have taken out the policy in the first place; however, she didn't want it. She needed it, but God it killed her to take it.

Though Rachel couldn't articulate why it killed her, here was the reason. Taking the money in her mind was like saying they were really gone. It was also giving validation to the payout as the inherent worth of the people she loved. Had Rachel taken the check and ripped it up, she wouldn't have been accepting a paltry sum in exchange for her parents' lives. That was the reason she vomited in the bathroom, and why she cried all the way home.

Home.

It was an odd word in her thoughts when she turned the corner on Park and saw the stately home at 24192 Sycamore. It was odd that of all the things running through her mind, the thought of that house as her home rung so sharply that she became aware of it. She made a wide turn on the cul-de-sac and pulled into the driveway she had cleared before leaving last night.

Before cutting the engine, she stared bleary eyed at the clock on the dash. If the delivery guys were on time, she had a few hours before her old bedroom stuff arrived from storage. It was the last part she had waited to move in.

It wasn't entirely because of Quinn. It was mostly because of the poltergeist and the fury that Rachel could only imagine she would have after her abode was turned upside down. Any sensible person would be angry as hell and Rachel figured Quinn Fabray was as sensible as any other person, or ghost for that matter.

No, there was another part, smaller, but no less disconcerting as to why she hadn't moved her bedroom in. It was surrendering to the idea that the house she grew up in wouldn't be hers ever again.

The bank wouldn't work with her. Well, okay, they _would_ work with her if she could pay what the other interested buyer in the property had offered. And those bastards had more money than God apparently. She was going to have to let it go. It was daunting to even think about, the very idea that she would drive by that house, feel the urge to pull into the driveway, but know it wasn't her drive, her home, her place anymore.

It was painful to a degree that she couldn't even totally process, or understand. Hanging on the steering wheel in her _new _driveway, she stared at the chipping paint on the garage and thumped her head hard on the plastic. It hurt, but not enough to eliminate the pain everywhere else.

And then a thought struck her and it didn't make any sense as to why it made her feel better. She wasn't coming home to an empty tattered house. She was coming home to a neatly polished foyer, to a kitchen where appliances had been delivered before the bank opened, a furnished family room and she wasn't alone.

Alone.

The idea of having a haunted house had admittedly bothered her a little at first, but slowly she shined onto the idea. The idea that someone, for lack of a better turn of phrase – lived and breathed in her home, was exhilarating. And never having to be alone? That was even better in her book.

Rachel got out, meandering toward the front door with slow deliberate steps. During her short walk she tried to channel some excitement since this was the morning after she put the lamps in Quinn's studio. Where she had never had a shortage of gusto in her life, she was having a hard time feeling the nervous tickle she should. After all, who knew what the ghost had painted fresh on her canvas upstairs?

She could hardly get the key in the door, stupid and tired as she was, but when she finally did the sight before her was one she wasn't expecting. It fired a hot arc of excitement through her, and left her thoughtless regarding all other dismal dwellings.

The lamps were in the foyer. Her eyes traveled over the braided rod iron, measuring the four stands before her. For a moment, she thought she might have dreamed the whole thing, that somehow she had left them downstairs and imagined the rest. That seemed more reasonable than them standing before her having been dragged from upstairs. Was she still holding the door? Rachel looked back at it; it was closed. When did she close the door?

Then she noticed the stained design in the center of the floor.

She had left it in a sad state the last time she had worked on it. The term 'sad state' was code for: absolutely shitty execution. There were places that the stain hadn't been dark enough, the lines not crisp enough and she wasn't going to even talk about symmetry, because it was just being masochistic.

However, now the glistening pattern before her was perfect.

It was more than perfect and her purse slipped from her hand to the floor as her eyes fixed on it.

The fleur-de-lis was lighter in the center, shaded three dimensionally to darker angled tips; razor sharp careful lines bolded the image against the lighter quadrant of the floor. It even had shadows under it, but as Rachel moved closer she saw they were ghosted designs of some kind. She released the breath she didn't realize she had been holding. And as her eyes lifted to the empty room, she glanced at the lamps before her.

"Quinn?"

It had to be Quinn. The silence stretched, until she became aware of the light nearest the staircase starting to glow. She stared at it, dumbfounded. Even in the middle of the day, a wave of chills covered her. Rachel squinted into the space beyond the light as if she would be able to see a manifestation of the ghost's presence. She waited breathlessly, straining into the area toward the staircase.

"Quinn?" She asked again, her voice trembling.

Rachel had always tried to be prepared for anything. She had stressed awareness and intelligence for dealing with every curve life could throw at her. She was quick, flexible, alert.

But - Rachel could never be ready for what came.

"Yes?"

The soft echo, layered in some type of eternal depth, rang in her ears. It rendered her unable to speak and _that_ was a feat unto itself. She staggered a step closer, unable to command her normally confident steps. Again, more words carved out of thin air. "Be careful, it's still wet."

Rachel looked down mutely at the stained space of floor in front of her. She looked through it, unable to focus on what was happening. She could only ask very _very_ lamely.

"Quinn, is that really you?"

"Yes."

Oh my God. Her heart beat wildly in her chest. Rachel was talking to a ghost! A beautiful ghost! She didn't miss how random that added thought was, and how much more nervous it made her.

"I don't know what to say. Oh my God, I didn't ever think this would happen, I mean I did, but I didn't have any idea it would be like this talking to you. Oh Quinn, the fleur-de-lis is beautiful!"

"It seems to me that you were able to find something to say." Rachel could hear the snicker in her tone and the sarcasm, which was actually something she rather enjoyed. Wit and sarcasm and emoting were her favorite things in conversation.

"I'm not saying anything of value though."

Quinn laughed or at least it _sounded_ like a laugh. "The compliment had value to me."

With all the millions of words she had at her disposal and all the things she has said over the past month, the fact that Rachel's mind went blank now was just – stupid. She grabbed for anything. "So, you did paint this?"

"I did. You said it was a job for me."

And the beautiful ghost listened to her!

The thunderstorm of giddy ridiculous excitement Rachel felt in that moment just about made her feel faint. To cover the motion, she reached out and wrapped a trembling hand around the lamp closest to her.

"Have you been listening to me?"

"How could I not?" Quinn laughed again. It was funny. The ghost was funny! She had a soft breathy laugh that made Rachel tremble just for the sake of how wantonly melodic it was. It was contagious, and Rachel giggled a little in admittance of her constant chatter.

"It's a problem I'm trying to deal with. People find my chattering off putting at times, but honestly it just gives me comfort."

When no answer came, Rachel frowned. "I'm sorry, I was smiling. It isn't a problem at all. You _were_ talking to me after all, unless there is another ghost here I don't know about."

"No, no other ghost."

"Good."

Rachel pressed her lips into a line as her eyes glanced up at the glowing filament. How would it work, if the ghost came closer? "Can you come into the light?"

It took a moment for the answer to come. "Do you want me to?"

"I wouldn't have asked if I didn't want you too. It seems like that would be the next logical step."

"I don't want to scare you." Rachel didn't know the ghost all _that_ well, obviously – but that statement sounded like she took great effort to sound matter-of-fact. As if she was just talking about the weather, which meant that she was hiding something.

"Why would you scare me? Are you gross and melted? I need to know so I'm ready." Rachel was surprised when her honest response made Quinn laugh harder, louder, and certainly a little forced.

"No. I don't think so. I mean, I don't know how that would have happened."

"Do you look like the girl in the painting?"

"I used to."

"What does _that_ mean?"

What _did_ that mean? Oh God, she's not melted but she is all bloody and gutsy; dripping blood eternally in an endless loop of spurting red. Maybe broken bones too. Rachel steeled herself.

"What are you doing?"

Rachel squinted an eye open. "I'm just preparing myself."

Quinn did not sound amused when her words came. "I'm not gross, just wispy at first, so don't get freaked out." A sigh followed, "how about this, what is your favorite color?"

She sounded rather annoyed and Rachel crossed her arms over her chest as she measured the empty space. "Pink."

"Okay, I'll wear my favorite pink dress."

"You can change your-" but any further words died on Rachel's lips. The first thing she saw was the light brightening. It was funny how her eyes razored to the filament so intensely that she couldn't see anything else. Inch by inch she knew the ghost was moving toward her because of it. And then the second and third lights started to brighten. That was when she saw the faintest whip of gold and pink. It looked like smoke, fast moving smoke that twined and bent in tendrils.

Rachel was transfixed; hanging on the blur that seemed to steadily gain form until at the top Rachel could see those eyes. She had always been admittedly _very _into eyes; they were the windows to a person's soul after all. However, these eyes, even partially translucent, dear God they were amazing. They shifted and churned and seemed to be smiling at her.

When the lamp above Rachel's head fired up, the ghost snapped into solidity. The force of her transition rebounding into Rachel, making her knees quiver. Instead of floating, the ghost, girl, no woman - was standing just on the other side of the stained floor. Rachel's eyes went wide and she just leered, and Rachel Berry wasn't the leering type. She was a little more covert than that and liked to think she had mastered the art of the veiled glance. However, she couldn't tear her eyes away as she did a slow motion drag up to the ghost's face.

The ghost - Quinn, was barefoot and Rachel's eyes hung there for a moment before tracing the length of her legs. They kept going, softly defined calves that bowed just enough to be elegant and a glimpse of toned thighs before the hem of her pink dress. The dress, cotton and airy clung to the edges of rounded hips, punctuating the form of her pelvis. A narrowing waist and arching ribcage followed. Rachel didn't feel her mouth fall open as her eyes hurried past firm breasts and a long tumble of golden hair. However, she knew it was standing open when she finally focused on a soft smile on pink lips. Those eyes twinkled at her with laughter and framed as they were in golden shadow, they glowed.

"You are unfairly beautiful." Rachel hurried and swallowed raggedly. She had often heard about women who were just ridiculously captivating, but she'd never really met one. She assumed she hadn't anyway because she had never run into a light pole looking at someone like they do in the movies. However, Quinn– wow, her thoughts were a jumble. She could have walked into the side of a house looking at this girl, walked off a cliff for God's sake. Rachel wouldn't have been the wiser.

"Unfairly, huh?"

The look of semi-smugness and amusement that faced her was the same that stared at her from the portrait. Mint green and gold eyes measured her silently, reflecting the light that blazed around them. A sculpted eyebrow was arched so artfully at her Rachel felt herself actually unable to breathe. She couldn't. She wanted to, but everything got stuck by how tight her throat was.

"Last night and today is the most solid I've been in ten years."

For the first time in probably as many years, Rachel had nothing to say. Her brain just stopped working and it probably had something to do with how hard her blood was screaming into her face.

"So, train wreck?" Quinn asked lightly gesturing to herself.

Rachel shook her head slowly, hands - both of them, squeezed the lamp beside her as she held herself up. "You still look like the painting."

"Okay, good. I'm not melted." Quinn's cheeky smile made Rachel's brain cache delete again.

There was a long silence where Rachel begged her brain to work; begged silently for her mouth to form words. She also begged for her blush to go away because she looked ridiculous when she was flushed. When she felt like she might be able to open her mouth without incoherent gibberish coming out, at the same instant Quinn forced words out of her mouth.

"I like the house."  
"I have so much I want to ask you."

They blinked at one another. "Sorry." That was in unison.

"Go ahead." Rachel whispered, clinging to the lamp like a lifeline.

"I like what you're doing to the place. It's nice." Quinn pointed at the varnished fleur-de-lis in the center of the foyer's floor. "You did a good job with that. It was easy to go from where you left off."

Rachel's eyes followed the motion and she traced the design before answering. "It was uneven."

"It was an easy fix."

"Maybe for an artist like you, but for me, not so much I'm afraid." Rachel glanced up appraisingly. "You really are an amazing artist. I was excited to see if you had worked on your painting upstairs."

"Priorities first, and this seemed higher on the list of things that needed to be done."

"So, you are okay with the house?"

Quinn twisted her hand around the lamp beside her, her fingers twining so delicately Rachel's gaze hammered there like a sledge. She couldn't tear herself away, even when the ghost started talking. "It was frustrating at first, but I think change can be good."

Rachel sighed, "I suppose if you are open to it."

"Yeah, exactly," Quinn regarded her for a moment her cooling gaze calculated. "You went to the bank today. You told me yesterday you had to go."

Rachel grimaced a little, felt her features screw up into a pained expression. Quinn frowned. "Yes, I did."

The frown across from her deepened further. "I'm sorry."

"Me too."

Another stretch of silence consumed the foyer, stretching uncomfortably long as both women tried to figure out what to say next. It was a very uncomfortable stopping point to say the least. It was Quinn, who forged ahead. "I had to sign for your delivery of kitchen stuff."

Rachel blinked, unsure if she heard correctly. "How did you sign for it?"

The ghost shrugged. "I was down here and when the guys knocked I opened the door. They thought I was you, so I signed your name."

Oh. Okay. And her words were the same as her thoughts. "Oh, okay." Well, almost the same, sans the elongated pause.

"Sorry." Quinn shrugged a little, running her hand through her hair uncomfortably. "I, um, didn't want you to miss the appliances. If it makes you uncomfortable you can consider it payback for the way you came in and moved everything around in my house."

Rachel shook her head to clear her thoughts. "Nice, thanks for rubbing that in." She smiled easily; relieved a little that they could at least joke about it. "So, you can interact with things and people in the light?"

"Yes, well – it depends on how much light."

That caught Rachel's attention. "What do you mean?"

Quinn sighed, not in irritation, but in the difficulty of articulating it. "Well, one light typically will get me to a shadow, two is closer to solid. Three or more is typically the ticket."

"What about more?"

"How many are we talking about?"

"Ten?"

Quinn smirked. "Trying to figure out a way to explode me?"

It made Rachel horrified that the ghost would even think that. "No! Not at all. I was just wondering if the more light you have the more real you become."

"I assume so, I've never tested it."

Rachel's dark eyes narrowed. "We could, I have a delivery coming with more lamps in it. We could see just how corporeal you can be."

The made Quinn uneasy and she smiled tightly. "Let's not rush into that. I think this is fine for now."

Crestfallen, Rachel realized she was being too pushy. "I'm sorry, you're right." Oh but how amazing would it be to have a room full of lights that would make the ghost alive again. The idea of it was so exciting she grinned inappropriately large given the situation.

"What are you smiling about?"

Rachel wiped the expression from her face and the thoughts that were creating it too. "Nothing."

The ghost's brow arched again, but she let the comment pass. "So, anyway, they delivered a stove, a dishwasher and a refrigerator. I didn't know where you wanted them, so I just guessed."

Rachel nodded, processing. "I'm sure it was the right places. If not, they have wheels so I can move them."

Quinn pursed her lips. "Okay."

Rachel saw the look of veiled irritation and she retracted her words. "I'm sorry." She had to get her thoughts straight. What the hell! "I didn't mean to make it sound like what you picked was wrong, or that my way is better. I'm sorry; I'm not thinking straight right now. This is just all so incredible."

That seemed to soften the spirit across from her, at least a little. "It's okay. I get it." She waved her off lightly. "Go look."

Rachel nodded slowly. "Will you be here when I get back?"

"Sure."

But she lied, because Quinn wasn't.


	5. Chapter 4

**A/N: Sorry about the last chapter. Everything should be cleaned up now. That is why you shouldn't edit half asleep no matter how badly you want to put something else out for everyone. /lesson learned. :)**

* * *

**Chapter 4**

* * *

Quinn didn't leave just because of how quickly Rachel made her feel unsatisfactory on all accounts. She left mostly because the brunette had unwittingly hurt her in other ways.

It was a Catch 22 in every way duality could bother someone. Rachel had hurt her with her acceptance as much as she could have hurt her with her rejection. It was an odd situation to be in; to have the best possible outcome still hurt as much as the counterpoint. It wasn't so much that it was Rachel honestly, though something about the petite brunette _did _something to Quinn. No, not just her - it was that _anyone _would be so willing to make room in their life for her. It meant that an almost perfect stranger had more tolerance than the people that _should_ have loved her most.

That someone she didn't even really know cared more than her family, trusted she wasn't evil or an abomination, made her feel as broken as she had been in life. And that just wasn't acceptable to Quinn.

To be frank, it hurt like a bitch.

So she had done what it was that she always did when something hurt her. She escaped from it. Death was kind of an overarching escape in retrospect though. She could just vanish, never to be seen again if she really wanted it that way. Did she really want it that way?

She tucked herself into the space beside her easel and watched as down the hall, Rachel directed the movers on where to put everything. Every once in a while, those dark eyes would flit over to the open doorway of Quinn's old bedroom, and hang. Those eyes hung on her existence, contemplated it fully with their unyielding warmth.

It was more than the look she was giving her now though. It was the look down in the foyer too that had Quinn a little off balance. Quinn was no dummy; she knew what the looks Rachel had given her meant. It meant the brunette was attracted to her.

More than that though, and this was the true hanging point, Quinn liked the attention. She had always selfishly enjoyed the looks people had given her. As shallow as it might have seemed she found validation in the long stares and cat calls she had once received. She clung to that flimsy ego boost even now, twenty years after her demise.

But Rachel. Quinn curled into herself, wrapping her arms around her knees. Rachel giving her that same predatory look, the same fiery gaze made Quinn feel stripped naked. In a good way, not a flashlight in the buff, ninja kind of way. Which to be fair actually bothered her a lot more than some random person gawking at her.

She honestly liked Rachel. It was more than the fact that the brunette had casually acknowledged her existence. It was also because she was bubbly and talkative, imaginative and sensitive. She was all the things that Quinn had always wanted to be, but found that being closed off and superior afforded her an easier existence. It wasn't that Quinn lacked emotion or wasn't sensitive; she was very sensitive to some things, but as fragile as her heart was, was how much thicker her skin needed to be to protect it.

So she shut down and closed off, even before she was made a spirit. That was probably what made her a spirit in the first place. How cliché, for the beautiful young girl to die of a broken heart?

"Okay, thank you."

Rachel's voice punctuated her reality from the top of the staircase and Quinn stared at her as she waved down at what Quinn assumed were the movers. The lines of Rachel's body were very pretty, very symmetrical, which Quinn appreciated. As an artist she had learned that people weren't beautiful or ugly; the brain didn't actually see that. The human brain saw symmetry. The closer to mirrored perfection a face or body got, the more attractive it became. And Rachel was quite symmetrical in all regards.

Which made it that much worse that Rachel had given her those looks. Because she was a ghost and nothing could ever happen.

"Quinn?"

The blonde looked up, past her knees, past the doorway to where Rachel was leaning on the banister just outside of her room. The brunette was glancing around fruitlessly. There were no lamps to make Quinn appear after all.

"I'm sorry if I said something to hurt you. I didn't mean to make it seem like your opinions don't matter." Rachel flipped the paper in her hand, her eyes absently staring down at the delivery receipt. "I'm not the best at this by any means. I'm not good with people. I want to try to be a good roomie though. I think we should talk about ground rules so that we don't step on each others toes like I did earlier."

Quinn sighed silently. She just should have come clean about why she left. Hell she still could, but her ego screamed out refusing to allow _that _to happen. And Quinn's ego would forever override her common sense.

"So, just let me know what you want, you know, short of me leaving because I have nowhere else to go." Rachel sighed then, deep and heavy. "I'm not going to come into your area over here unless you invite me. I'll get you a few lamps though, so you can appear if you want. I'll put them out here so you can place them where you want to."

She backed up a step and Quinn watched how reticent the motion was. "I hope that makes things better." Rachel opened her mouth to say something more, but decided against it and reached forward to close the door.

Alone in her room, knowing Rachel was out in the hall was a peculiar kind of agony. It wasn't just emotional over the fact that she had someone _finally_ who didn't fear her. It was also because she missed conversation, missed feeling alive and certainly missed being thought of as unfairly beautiful.

It was also because she was the only one keeping the connection at bay. It would be one thing if Rachel had shunned her and Quinn had fled, but because she hadn't it was all on Quinn's shoulders. She was creating her own exile and that was just stupid.

It was stupid _and_ cowardly if Quinn was being honest about it. And though when it came to some things Quinn could be kinda dense, she certainly wasn't a coward. She gathered herself up, albeit a little slowly and hesitant and floated toward the door. She would explain to Rachel why she was so upset. It was the least she could do when the brunette had practically spilt her heart out over the last month.

Quinn slid through the door and the bright light on the other side of the door assaulted her. She flinched, for no other reason than yeah, it scared her – what? And when she wheeled around in retreat she slammed face first into the bedroom door.

Hard.

She hit it hard enough to splinter white flashes behind her eyelids and the resounding thud echoed all the way downstairs. Quinn backed away from the paneling and cupped a hand over her face in reflex. It hurt. She stared at the front side of the freshly painted door and blinked.

It hurt.

She opened the door belatedly, hand still cupped over her nose and mouth. She had to remember she needed to _open _doors, especially when Rachel told her she was putting light outside. God damn it! It was enough to make her rattle with anger at herself.

In the moment between turning and looking down the landing beyond, Quinn prayed Rachel wasn't going to be there staring at her. Gratefully, she wasn't and Quinn regarded the four brightly lit lamps before her. Well, that was interesting. She glanced over her shoulder. It might have been awkward to actually get caught _in_ the wood paneling. What a bunch of bullshit that would have been.

She probed her nose with cautious hands. It felt fine. She sniffed, smoothing her hair into some semblance of order. Okay. She noted the novel concept of opening doors to herself and firmed her face once again in determination.

"Quinn?"

It came from downstairs and Quinn rolled her eyes as she peeked over the wooden banister beside her. She watched as Rachel came out of the kitchen, looking up while a towel worked over her hands. The brunette smiled a little, a whisper of relief passing over her face. "Was that you? Did you need help with something?"

Yeah, Quinn needed help not being so stupid. "Yes it was and no, I'm fine."

She admittedly sounded very clipped and with a sigh, Quinn fixed Rachel with a softer gaze. "Do you have a minute to talk?"

Rachel swallowed visibly. Why wouldn't she, after all – the way Quinn said it sounded an awful lot like the lead in to a break up. They weren't even dating, but it had the dramatic effect nonetheless on Rachel's upturned face.

"Okay. Did you wanna come down? I'm making food in the kitchen."

Quinn nodded and once out of the radius of light she was able to fade through the staircase and pop into the living room. Just to be on the cautious side, she walked through the kitchen archway rather than sliding through a wall she could get stuck in, or slam her face into. As ludicrous as that sounded, Quinn was that level of fail around Rachel Berry apparently.

Rachel had dragged a desktop light onto the kitchen counter and between that, the hanging light in the eat in nook and the kitchen light, Quinn popped into solidity again. Good thing she didn't whip through a wall or she might have been part of the artwork rather than staring at it. How would she get out of a wall? Would Rachel have to pull the light bulbs out of every lamp near her?

"So what did you want to talk about? I really hate it when conversations start with 'we have to talk'. It all sounds so final." Rachel didn't look up, didn't glance over. She continued to flip the food in the skillet before her.

"It's more about me and less about you." Quinn cleared her throat and took up the recently added bar stool on the other side of the counter. She watched Rachel cook, smiling a little as the overhead light from the stove put a golden wash over her face. "I don't get along with people well either."

"Oh."

Quinn arched a brow as she struggled to articulate herself. It was always so difficult to tell the truth about something emotional. If she had half the balls in sensitive conversations as she had in everything else in her life, it would be easy. Hell, life would be easy.

"Okay I'm just gonna say it quick."

"Like pulling off a band aid?" Rachel chimed as she pulled dark brown circles from the frying pan. Quinn watched them plop onto a folded paper towel to drain.

"Yes, exactly."

"Can you smell this?" Rachel asked lightly.

"What?"

"Can you smell the food I'm making?"

Quinn shook her head, trying to straighten her thoughts. "No." She furrowed her brows at how Rachel was stalling her and how successful it was at totally discombobulating her thoughts. "Now, do you want me to tell you or not?"

"Too bad. Go ahead."

Quinn flattened her palms on the counter and took a breath. "So it had nothing to do with you. Well, not _you_ you specifically, it's more about everything I've experienced and this is just a very dramatic change for me."

Rachel nodded slowly as she meticulously added more breaded pieces of food to the oil in the pan before her. Quinn stared at it, wondering what it was to preoccupy her mind. It took a considerable amount of time before the brunette said anything, "can you elaborate further?"

Quinn frowned, because it was already hard enough to say the first bit. "Um, I don't think I can."

"Okay."

Rachel turned the burner off and the scratch of the frying pan as it was moved, sounded absolutely jarring in the spacious kitchen. It seemed to resonate inside Quinn's brain as Rachel turned toward her and measured her across the countertop.

Quinn had never been one for close conversations. That's kinda a lie, because she had thought about them. She had often thought about having an intimate conversation with someone. Heads tilted toward one another and talking, yeah - she had thought about that a lot. However, the reality was much more daunting because even though three feet of slab stood between her and Rachel, she lost all the saliva in her mouth.

"What are you making?" Quinn asked hoping to redirect the conversation away from whatever it was that was creating the look of seriousness across from her.

"Nice redirect, I will humor you for a minute." Rachel noted softly before she glanced over her shoulder, "Eggplant Parmesan."

"Oh." Quinn took an exaggerated breath trying to smell the food that was cooling on the plate beside the brunette. Sadly, she couldn't.

"So, since you were listening to me upstairs," Rachel brought the conversation back now that the minute had passed, "do you agree that maybe we should have some type of ground rules? I mean, I would like to avoid anything uncomfortable at least for as long as we are both here."

Rachel's words, though absolutely intelligent and rational, struck a chord in Quinn that brought her attention to the gaze spearing into her.

Even though Quinn asked the question after a frozen second of fear, she really didn't want the answer. She just couldn't help it. "What do you mean as long as we are _both _here?"

What the hell did she mean by that? Quinn's golden eyes traced the face before her. Over the past month it had seemed that Rachel was a benevolent sort of person, not someone who would try to get rid of her. And the very idea of it, as expected as it would be from other people, actually twisted Quinn up enough to feel anguish over it. After all, Rachel had _seen_ her. Really seen who she was that first day in her room.

A hammer on the front door stopped Quinn's internal monologue and forced her lips into a straight line to keep from probing further. Rachel kept her eyes on Quinn though, her calculated gaze taking her in. When the knock came again she finally looked over toward the door. "Did you want to get it, or should I?"

Oh man, Rachel had a palpable tone of irritation and Quinn rolled her eyes until she too was staring in the direction of the insistent knocker. "With the tone you have right now, I think it would be best if you answer the door from now on."

The brunette measured her coolly. "Okay, I think that is a good idea. Think about other rules while I deal with what is probably another of your _many _fans."

Quinn was admittedly good at verbal sparring, but the sheer level of sarcasm in Rachel's voice was truly something to behold. Obviously the brunette was mad at her over opening the door and signing for her delivery. What Quinn didn't understand was why. After all, it wasn't like she was going to kill Rachel off and assume her identity and she certainly didn't have a vested interest in the cooking stuff because, hello - she didn't eat. So, the _why _as to Rachel being so bent didn't seem to fit.

And boy was she bent. Even as Quinn watched her walk to the door she could see how stiff she was. Rachel always seemed to move fluidly, but right now she looked like she had a broom up her ass. Which would understandably make anyone walk rather stiffly.

Quinn tried to puzzle why the brunette would be _so _angry over her trying to help. Was it because of her fathers?Or because Rachel didn't like help? Again, Quinn's mental musing cut itself short when she realized Rachel wasn't talking. She had grown so used to her voice, the silence without it seemed to be foreign now. From her place at the counter, she leaned back just enough to see the open edge of the front door. Rachel's tan hand was wrapped around the width of it.

It really wasn't any of Quinn's business, at least she told herself that and she rolled her eyes going back to her thoughts. Apparently it wasn't one of _her _fans, and Quinn added a healthy dose of sarcasm as well to the thought.

It annoyed her that people seemed to sprinkle by and come see the crazy woman that owned the haunted house on Sycamore. Granted she had built the terror in herself, it was all her own doing - but secretly it made her feel bad. The feeling bad part wasn't for herself, it was more for the twenty year old girl who answered the door constantly, and occasionally had to mop up foodstuffs that had been thrown on the porch.

When Rachel came back into the kitchen with a crisp white sheet of paper in her hand and a confused look on her face, Quinn was instantly concerned. Rachel never looked confused, even when she probably should be. "What is it?"

Rachel looked up, her eyes going back to trace the typed letter. "It's from the town council." She frowned deeply. "They want me to finish the exterior renovation of the house or fine me for every month I'm not in line with the homeowner's association guidelines."

Quinn raised a brow. And thank you Sally Hanson for never ceasing to be a dick. "Yeah, that is cause you tossed Sally out on her ass last month. You can thank her for that."

Rachel's mouth moved, but no sound came out. "I didn't even know we _had _a homeowner's association." Rachel huffed a little, setting the paper down on the counter before landing her eyes on Quinn's face. "What kind of town, the size of a pinprick, has a homeowner's association? You have those in big cities where you don't know your neighbor. You don't do it in a place where everyone knows everyone, it's just a waste of time."

Quinn agreed with that. "Yeah, it's something new that Sally put into effect just because she is trying to lobby for mayor. She wants to win people's hearts by raping their checkbook apparently and then making them forget by building something pretty with all their money."

"Nice."

"Yeah."

Quinn waited a breath, studying the newly formed lines of irritation in Rachel's face. She hadn't seen that look before and it puzzled her. Certainly, Rachel had dealt with much more difficult things over the past month, a little semi-threatening letter wasn't the worst of it. Though a part of her, a relatively large part wanted to say something comforting, she found herself unable to do that. She let the things she wanted to say fall unspoken on the counter top.

Instead she did the only thing she was comfortable with. Redirect. "So, you gonna finish dinner roomie?" When Rachel met her eyes, Quinn smiled mildly.

"No. I'll clean it up later."

* * *

Quinn stood in the brightly lit kitchen alone. Rachel had been upstairs for an hour and the food on the counter still stood unattended. She stared through the eggplant wedges and the paper towels beneath them. It bothered her that someone could upset Rachel enough to make her leave her delectable dinner incomplete. It made her sad for some strange reason.

The blonde chewed her lip as she measured the food before her. She remembered what breaded eggplant tasted like. She had enough light that she could just reach out and take one. What would it do if she ate a bite?

Quinn felt her face twitch as she contemplated it and her hand mapped of its own volition to the counter top. She swallowed as she picked up a small piece. Her fingernails speared it and she stared at it. It felt a little soft now, it would have been crunchy earlier, but now it was just kind of sad. For as badly as she wanted to taste food again, she knew her face was making the most painful contortion at the prospect.

She sighed at herself and popped the morsel into her mouth. The worst that could happen would be she would turn to a shadow and leave a chewed piece of food somewhere. As she munched she contemplated just how gross that would actually be, and almost spit it out into the sink.

Sadly, she couldn't taste anything, but had she really been expecting it to have flavor? She sighed after swallowing. Quinn left the plate and her defeat at the hand of the soggy eggplant and stared out the window.

The spring's misting rain had turned harder, and she lost count of the drops as they streaked past the streetlamp outside. She had stood here so many times, watching the rain. It rained a lot in the spring. It was how she knew it was that season. That and there wasn't any snow on the ground.

She missed the rain strangely. That was one thing that she never would have imagined. When she had been alive, she had been so preoccupied with how she looked, she used to curse it. When it curled her hair with humidity, ruined her make-up or got into her shoes, she had hated it and avoided it at all costs.

But now - now she missed the idea of feeling it streak over her. She wanted to stand in the rain and shiver as the cold drops pierced against her shoulders. It was almost obsessive how badly she felt the urge to just run through it. She wanted to dress herself into her workout clothes and just race down the street in the rain.

Rain.

Quinn moved from the window. Oh shit. A realization shot through her mind and she back peddled until she was staring through the kitchen archway, across the foyer, to the staircase. Rachel's room leaked. The roof needed to be repaired.

Quinn left the kitchen, losing her form and then gaining it back slightly as she lit the chandelier above her head. She took the stairs to be on the safe side. At the top, she froze outside Rachel's room. She couldn't knock because there wasn't any light. Would the brunette be upset if she just popped into her room.

Quinn frowned. Most certainly.

Down the landing, the four lamps sat dark and idle and she hurried over. When Quinn popped back into solidity she grabbed them enmass, circling her arms around them and with substantial effort, tiptoed back down the hall. They clanged together and she found it hard to believe that Rachel couldn't hear her outside her room.

Rachel was ignoring her. She had to be because there was no way that the sounds the lamps were making were all in her head. When she finally set them down, she was corporeal enough to knock on the door. So she did.

"Rachel?"

She chewed the inside of her lip as she waited for the response. It took a minute, but finally she heard the muted, "yes?" from behind the door.

"Hey, do you have a second?"

"Come in."

Quinn hadn't been expecting that response. She had expected Rachel to open the door so she could report what she knew. Instead she found her hand on the doorknob and she was twisting it open.

Rachel was sitting on the middle of the floor, a cup held in her hand. It was a mug, the same mug Rachel drank all her tea in. Quinn let the door tap lightly against the newly installed stopper. "I forgot to tell you this room leaks. The roof needs to be patched and -" Quinn's sentence was cut off when the ceramic mug in Rachel's hand plunked as a drop fell into it.

"I see that." Rachel noted looking up at the ceiling. It wasn't her normal voice. It was dulled and without the normal bubble of brightness she put into everything. "Thank you for letting me know."

"Sure." Quinn glanced at the door. "Did you want me to," she clutched the doorknob in her hand.

"Yeah, please close it."

"Okay." Quinn nodded slowly to herself as she started to pull the door closed. She wished she could say something that would make Rachel feel better. Quinn tightened her hand on the door and halted its motion.

"Rachel, everything will be okay." When the brunette looked up at her, Quinn could tell she had been crying. It was the same glassy-eyed, red look she always had after a good cry. It scrambled words out of her mouth. "It may feel just terrible right now, but I know things will get better. They can only be down so long."

Rachel scoffed, setting the mug down on the darker part of the area rug that had gotten wet. "How long has it been down for you?"

Quinn pursed her lips, leaning on the door frame. "Twenty years, but-"

"That's too long a time for me."

Quinn nodded, "but, Rachel - it's looking up again and that is all that matters."

"I'm sorry but I find it hard to believe any up is worth twenty years of down."

Quinn shrugged lightly. Wasn't that the truth? It might have been at one point, but for Quinn, right now, it felt different. "Having an awesome roomie is most definitely worth it."

Rachel shook her head. "I'm not an awesome roomie."

"Sure you are." Quinn wedged with a smile, "you fed me the first bite of food I've had in twenty years."

Rachel smiled. "And how was it?"

"Utterly tasteless."

And she laughed then - bright and shining and beautiful. It made Quinn's heart feel better. "No, really. It was good right?"

Quinn arches her brow and grinned. "I'll go clean up the kitchen."

"Wait. Tell me! It was good right? If it wasn't you can tell me that too."

And it was Quinn's turn to laugh as Rachel followed her downstairs.

Quinn was mighty proud of herself too when she got Rachel to finish her dinner with promises of telling her how it tasted. And they ate what was most likely spectacular parmesan together in the patchwork home they were creating.


End file.
